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NY trooper faked his own shooting, setting off a massive manhunt, Nassau DA says
By
Louis C. Hochman
Published Jan 27, 2025
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Conrad Williams Jr./Newsday RM via Getty Images
By
Louis C. Hochman
Published Jan 27, 2025
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A state trooper staged his own shooting on the Southern State Parkway in Nassau County in October — firing into his own leg, state police and local prosecutors said.
When Trooper Thomas Mascia reported that he’d been shot, it set off a dayslong, multi-state manhunt for a vehicle and driver that authorities have since said he made up entirely. State police “temporarily shut down the Southern State Parkway in an effort to locate the non-existent shooters, causing alarm and inconvenience to the public,” Trooper C.C. Weilminster said in a criminal complaint filed Monday.
State Police said they did not know what may have prompted Mascia to fake the shooting.
“We could surmise many instances whether he sought to get, a disability, retirement, whether he sought to seek the attention of unrequited love,” State Police Superintendent Steven G. James said at a press conference Monday. “Those are issues on the fringes that have come to our attention, but … nothing definitive.”
Mascia, 27, pleaded not guilty Monday morning to charges of tampering with physical evidence, falsely reporting a crime and official misconduct, and was released without bail. Nassau District Attorney Anne Donnelly said he could serve up to three years in state prison if convicted.
He’d been placed on unpaid suspension shortly after the incident, and state police said he resigned effective Friday of last week.
His parents were also charged with criminal possession of a firearm — a Smith & Wesson M&P15 rifle that the Nassau district attorney’s office said had features that qualified it as an assault weapon, and had been found when investigators searched the home the three shared. State police also said the trooper’s father was not allowed to have a gun because of a prior conviction.
Attorney Jeffrey Lichtman, representing Mascia and his parents, did not return a message seeking comment Monday.
In late October, state police said Mascia had been shot by someone he’d thought was a stranded driver on the westbound side of the parkway near Exit 17. At the time, police said they were looking for black sedan, possibly a Dodge Charger, with a specific temporary New Jersey license plate, based on Mascia’s description. They said Mascia had tended to his own wounds with a first aid kit, but didn’t return fire because the shooter immediately fled the scene. State and local officials praised Mascia’s bravery and hundreds of police and community members applauded when he was released from Nassau University Medical Center.
But on Monday, Donnelly said the shooter only existed “in Mascia’s head, in his imagination.”
State Police told Gothamist that while the license plate number Mascia had provided connected to a real person, that individual had no connection to the case.
James said that within a day of the shooting, members of the state police Bureau of Criminal Investigation were questioning inconsistencies in Mascia’s account. Video canvassing for the vehicle Mascia had described didn’t turn up anything, Donnelly said. There were nine shell casings found at the scene, but no projectiles and no tire marks, she said.
She also said no one had reported a disabled vehicle or the shooting to emergency services, and Mascia’s own body camera — which was off during the time of the reported shooting — never showed him trying to flag down a vehicle for help.
“ The evidence uncovered and the absence of evidence told us everything we needed to know,” Donnelly said. “Even though Mascia tried to hide his tracks, it didn't take long for everyone to uncover that his harrowing story was nothing more than an elaborate work of fiction.”
Authorities said they recovered the weapon Mascia allegedly used to shoot himself, as well as other firearms. They said he didn’t use his service weapon.
Investigators also found nearly $800,000 in the home Mascia shared with his parents, but that money has been tied to them, not the trooper, Donnelly said.
James said Mascia had been on the force since 2019 and served a 28-week stint as an academy training officer before returning to the road patrol in October.
“ Whether for sympathy, attention, to ease a wounded ego, what he did is unconscionable,” Donnelly said. “His selfish act wasted extraordinary resources across several police departments, it pulled law enforcement officers away from actual emergencies, and he put people at risk. Most of all, he failed his brothers and sisters in law enforcement and he failed his oath as an officer."
Donnelly continued, “But today he finds himself on the other side of the law, and I'm happy that we were able to put him there."
In a statement Monday, the Police Benevolent Association of the New York State Troopers said it was “sad and sickened” by the case,” and the incident “must not be allowed to cast a negative light,” on troopers as a whole.
“We’ll leave it to the court to ensure justice is served in this case,” the statement said.
In 2022, State Police posted on Facebook about another incident involving Mascia — saying he’d been injured by the side of Route 95 in Westchester County while removing debris. At Monday’s press conference, James said that incident — reported as a hit and run — was “ unsubstantiated and closed by investigation,” but there have been no definitive findings about it.
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Louis C. Hochman
After about two decades in (mostly) New Jersey-focused commercial print, digital and digital-but-radio-adjacent news, Lou stumbled into member-supported news in early 2021, as the editor and CEO of Montclair Local. There, he (hopes he) expanded enterprise, brought more sophistication to digital storytelling and moved the nonprofit newsroom closer to long-term financial sustainability. He helped lead the Local to its fourth consecutive General Excellence award from the New Jersey Press Association — the NJPA's highest honor with judges noting the paper's work to strip away layers of government opacity, to hold power to account, to make news accessible for more members of the community, to share the stories and concerns of more facets of the community and to tell compelling stories across multiple media. He's excited to continue the same ethic — news as a public service — at NYPR as the New Jersey and suburbs editor, drawing on the extraordinary talents of reporters including Karen Yi and Nancy Solomon. Lou lives in Philly (that commute!) with his partner and their two cats, about whom and about which he speaks incessantly.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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